As I have just filled in (or as U.S.  citizens would no doubt say,
filled out) Jody's MIDI survey, I'm filled with a warm virtuous glow
and that's enough to get this note written.

I use a computer every day at work but it's mostly for word processing,
although I have begun to analyze astronomical data on it recently.
However I know virtually nothing about transferring files and coding or
decoding them.

What I would like to be able to do boils down to this:

(i)   play MIDI files of piano music (like the Swedish ragtime
      mentioned recently) through my computer.  With the help of my son
      I did manage to listen to the Blue Danube Waltz and even
      identified it as the Schultz-Evler arrangement (did I get that
      right?).

(ii)  look at those Ampico master rolls of Wayne Stahnke.

(iii) play those master rolls if possible.

I've saved and read most of the discussion in the Digest over the last
six months about scanning and replaying rolls, and I hear a roaring in
my head when I think about it all.  Am I right in thinking that Wayne's
files are supposed to be looked at but not played because they are
recreations of master rolls not piano rolls?  But am I also right that
if you have an Ampico emulation program, you can play them?

When we played the Blue Danube it was certainly recognizable but the
sound was not at all piano-like.  I presume that was because my son's
SoundBlaster 16 card was never intended to be a piano synthesizer.  Am
I right in thinking that I'll need to plug the output from my son's
computer into something like an electronic piano keyboard with a MIDI
input?

It would be really great to end up with a list of necessary programs
and their sources and I hope that Jody's survey ends up producing one
for us dopes who just want to play some music for fun.

Why would anyone with about 3000 piano rolls want to play digital
music?  I can't answer that.  Regards from John Phillips.